Whitman
One whose name indicated someone with light-colored hair or skin.
Name Census estimates that about 741 living Americans carry the first name Whitman. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Whitman today is around 19 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Whitman births was 2018 (39 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Whitman. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
741
~ 1 in 462,556 Americans
Peak year
2018
39 babies that year
Average age
19
years old
2024 SSA rank
#4,174
Tracked since 1909
Census
Whitman in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 704 people with the first name Whitman, which placed it at #16,121 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#16,121
National first-name rank
People counted
704
704 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
81.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Whitman
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Whitman is White at 81.5%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (7.4%) and Black (5.8%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Whitman described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Whitman at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White81.5% · 574
- Hispanic or Latino7.4% · 52
- Black or African American5.8% · 41
- Two or more races3.1% · 22
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.8% · 13
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 2
Popularity
Whitman: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Whitman from the 1900s through to the 2020s, spanning 13 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 308 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Whitman remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Whitman by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Whitman during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Whitmans live
Origin
Meaning and history of Whitman
The given name Whitman is an English name that originated during the medieval period. It is a combination of the Old English words "hwit" meaning white and "mann" meaning man. The name likely referred to someone with fair hair or a pale complexion.
In its earliest forms, the name was spelled in various ways such as Hwittmann, Whytman, and Whiteman. It was a common surname in England, particularly in the northern counties, before eventually becoming used as a given name as well.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Whitman is found in the Domesday Book of 1086, which was a survey of land ownership in England commissioned by William the Conqueror. The name appears as a surname in this historical record.
Throughout history, there have been several notable individuals who bore the name Whitman. One of the most famous was Walt Whitman, the American poet, essayist, and journalist, who was born in 1819 and died in 1892. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential poets in American literature and is best known for his collection "Leaves of Grass."
Another notable Whitman was Marcus Whitman, an American missionary and physician who led a group of settlers along the Oregon Trail in the 1830s. He was born in 1802 and died in 1847.
In the world of sports, Grover Cleveland Whitman, known as "Whit," was an American baseball player who played in the Major Leagues between 1923 and 1948. He was born in 1900 and died in 1972.
William Whitman, born in 1836 and died in 1900, was an American businessman and industrialist who founded the Whitman Candy Company, which is known for its iconic Whitman's Sampler box of chocolates.
In the field of science, Walter Whitman, born in 1819 and died in 1892, was an American entomologist and botanist who made significant contributions to the study of plants and insects in the United States.
People
Whitman + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Whitman as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with W
Other first names starting with W with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Whitman: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Whitman?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 741 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Whitman going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 462,556 US residents.
Is Whitman a common name?
We classify Whitman as "Very Rare". It ranks above 88% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 868 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Whitman most popular?
The single biggest year for Whitman was 2018, when 39 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Whitman is about 19 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Whitman in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 704 people with the name Whitman, or 0.23 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #16,121 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Whitman in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Whitman?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Whitman leans strongly male. 689 people counted with this name were male (98.0%), compared with 14 female bearers (2.0%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Whitman?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Whitman is White at 81.5%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (7.4%) and Black (5.8%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Whitman most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Whitman in the 2020 Census, accounting for 81.5% (574 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Whitman in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Whitman a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Whitman in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Whitman still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Whitman in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Whitman can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have the name Whitman?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.